Online marketplaces typically maintain inventories of items in one or more storage or distribution facilities, which are sometimes called fulfillment centers. Such facilities may include stations for receiving shipments of items, for storing such items, and/or for preparing such items for delivery to customers. When a vendor delivers an inbound shipment of items to a fulfillment center, the items included in the inbound shipment may be removed from the container in which they arrived, and stored in one or more storage areas within the fulfillment center. Likewise, when an online marketplace receives an order for one or more items from a customer, the online marketplace may prepare an outbound shipment of the ordered items by retrieving the items from their respective storage areas within the fulfillment center, placing the items in an appropriate container with a suitable amount or type of dunnage, and delivering the container to the customer.
Many containers that arrive at a fulfillment center, or are prepared for delivery to customers from a fulfillment center, include one or more markings (e.g., numbers, sets of text or bar codes) or labels which reference or otherwise identify an order or shipment with which the containers are associated. Such markings or labels may be used to access information regarding the containers and/or their expected contents, which may be identified by resort to a registry, ledger, index or other list of information regarding the order or the shipment with which the markings or labels are associated.
Occasionally, the actual contents of a container may differ from the expected contents of the container, however. For example, a vendor may have included too few or too many items in a container of an inbound shipment, or an online marketplace may pack and ship a container associated with an outbound shipment may be prepared for delivery to a customer with too few or too many items. Similarly, a container associated with an inbound shipment or an outbound shipment may be prepared and packed with too much or too little dunnage, or with dunnage of an inappropriate type, or otherwise inappropriately positioned within the container. Shipping items in a container with too much dunnage, or with overly strong or durable dunnage, may unnecessarily increase the cost of delivering the items, while shipping items in a container with too little dunnage, or with insufficiently strong or durable dunnage, may increase the risk that such items will be damaged during transit. Once a container has been sealed, the actual contents of the container, or the conditions or locations of such contents within the container, may not be confirmed with a reasonable degree of certainty without opening the container.
Radiographic imaging, or X-ray imaging, is frequently used to identify and evaluate internal organs, bones or other matter within the human body, as well as the contents of suitcases or other luggage passing through security stations or checkpoints at airports, stadiums or other high-density facilities or other locations. One or more radiographic images, or X-ray images, of an object may be captured using traditional or digital radiographic or X-ray equipment, and information regarding the internal, hidden components of the object may be determined through one or more analyses of the captured radiographic or X-ray images.